


Calling the Blind Man’s Bluff

by CaelumLapis



Category: Smallville
Genre: Gen, Spoilers: General and specific for all episodes up to Season Two’s Duplicity.
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-15
Updated: 2020-06-15
Packaged: 2021-03-03 23:35:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,429
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24734023
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CaelumLapis/pseuds/CaelumLapis
Summary: “Ah, I just needed to get out of the mansion.” Lex stood up and pushed his hands into his pockets. “It’s getting crowded.”
Comments: 6
Kudos: 5





	Calling the Blind Man’s Bluff

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer is, I don’t own them, not even a little.

Clark backed into the kitchen, nudging the door open with a protesting squeal of aging hinges as he balanced the boxes in his hands. As he turned he saw Lex, sitting quietly at the table. He looked a little tense.

“Lex?”

“Hey. Your uh… your mom said it’d be okay if I waited for you.” Lex fidgeted, moving his hands to rest on the table and flexing his fingers. Okay, maybe more than just a little tense, and Clark found himself wondering if Lex would ever just suddenly spontaneously combust from all the pent-up energy he carried around. 

“Yeah, what’s up?” 

“Ah, I just needed to get out of the mansion.” Lex stood up and pushed his hands into his pockets. “It’s getting crowded.”

Clark thought of the mansion for a moment, and decided that a marching band, most of a circus, an entire petting zoo, and a church choir could probably coexist comfortably in one wing, without any risk of crowding. 

“Doesn’t it have, like, seventy-five rooms?”

Lex looked amused for a moment before offering a tiny, self-deprecating smile. “Yeah, well. My father takes up a lot of space.”

Oh. Right. Clark mentally amended his previous thought to state that the previously mentioned marching band, circus, petting zoo, and church choir would probably feel very crowded in that wing of the mansion if said wing contained a Lionel Luthor. He nodded and gave Lex a sympathetic smile in return. 

“When’s he going back to Metropolis?” Clark was more than okay with soon. Today, in fact, would be just fine for him. 

“Not soon enough,” Lex replied, punctuating the statement with a noisy puff of exhaled air.

“Is he really being that difficult?” Clark tried not to imagine all of the ways in which Lionel had demonstrated his expertise in being difficult.

“Just the opposite. He’s the picture of civility. Says he wants to work on our relationship.” That was definitely sarcasm, Clark thought. He tried to picture Lionel being civil, and mentally assigned him a pleasant smile to go with it. The mentally assigned smile looked bewildered and helplessly lost on the shifty terrain of Lionel’s face. 

“Is that such a bad thing?” Clark replied, his face doubtful. It was hard to imagine Lionel being civil. Really hard, actually. He gave the Lionel in his imagination a puppy to help with the kinder, gentler Lionel mental image; and then cringed as his imagination had Lionel yelling at the puppy about aspiring to greatness and not being ruled by its emotions, and then kicking it. Clark took the traumatized mental puppy away from Lionel and was about to mentally scold him when he caught Lex giving him a look, and he felt sheepish. 

Lex shook his head. “He’s lied to me so many times; it’s hard to believe that he doesn’t have an ulterior motive.”

Well, there was that. “Maybe give him the benefit of the doubt?” Clark’s imagination tried again giving Lionel the puppy, then snatched it away again when Lionel began to lecture it on Greek history, and the puppy cowered mournfully and piddled on the carpet. Maybe he should try with a less impressionable adult dog. 

“No, no. If a person’s deceived me once I find it hard to give them a second chance,” Lex responded. 

Now this was the kind of Lex-specific ambiguous statement that simultaneously made Clark want to apologize and yell that it wasn’t him and he had no idea what Lex was talking about. He settled for looking uncomfortable and mentally gave Lionel a collie. Maybe they could share grooming preferences. Mental Lionel gave the collie a derisive look and began to point out the colossal disappointment Lassie’s performance had been on those occasions when she’d been a few seconds later than recommended while saving Timmy. The collie blinked and gave Clark a look that quietly asked what it had done to deserve this. 

Lex moved closer. “By the way,” he said, conversationally, “do you remember that paperweight I had on my desk, the octagonal one?”

Clark briefly hit the pause button on his efforts to mentally construct a kinder, gentler Lionel, and focused on the question. 

_Oh, right. The octagonal key thing again. Well, you see, that’s the key to my spaceship. Want to take it for a spin, Lex? Or maybe not, I’ve seen the way you drive. Oh and by the way? I’m not exactly from around here._

_Shit. Don’t panic, don’t panic._

Clark wished for Lex’s poker face, and mentally changed the collie to a drooling mastiff that began chasing Lionel in circles in his head. 

“Um, kinda. Why?”

“Ah. It came up today, made me wonder what happened to it,” Lex answered, his expression thoughtful. 

“When did you lose it?”

Lex glanced at him. “During the storm.”

“Probably got carried away with all the other debris from the mansion. You know?” This, as it were, unfortunately had not included Lionel. Who in Clark’s head was now climbing up on a desk to avoid the mastiff, and screaming in an amusingly high-pitched voice about retribution on a truly magnificent and epic scale that would include neutering. The mastiff did not look impressed. 

“Yeah. I’m sure you’re right.” Lex looked away for a moment, then gave him another look and walked toward the door.

Clark kept the smile pasted on his face as Lex left, and then sighed inwardly and helped himself to a generous slice of guilt with a garnish of generalized anxiety. He wondered if there was a helpful platitude that dealt with the perils of being friends with overly curious people who noticed when you lied badly. He’d have to ask his dad about that one later. Except, without mentioning Lex, because his dad had a surprisingly vast collection of self-righteous anti-Luthor platitudes, and frankly, Clark was tired of hearing those.

He leaned back against the table and wondered what Lionel had done that was irritating Lex enough to make him flee the mansion. It had been weird to hear him admit that Lionel was bothering him. Lex didn’t ever admit that people bothered him, especially not Lionel. And Lionel was blind, which for a normal person, meant that he had a big Get Out of Jail Free card when it came to being annoying. But then, Lionel really was about as far from normal as-

_Wait._

Clark’s mind hit pause again on the mastiff and Lionel, who were engaged in a strange game of Keep Away that involved Lionel keeping as far away from the mastiff as possible, while still threatening it loudly. Unable to keep the devilish grin from his face, he sped into his mother’s craft room, rummaging in the drawers of a small dresser before he found what he wanted. 

Clark stuffed the small box into the pocket of his jeans and sped out of the room, racing out the kitchen door and almost colliding with Martha.

“Clark? Where are you going?” She stumbled back and fixed him with a startled expression.

“Out! Back later! Bye, Mom!” Clark sped through the fields, then as habit dictated, slowed to a normal human speed as he walked up the drive to the mansion. He slipped in through the servant’s entrance and wandered the halls quietly, ascending the stairs to the second floor. He switched to X-Ray vision and looked around slowly. He could see a familiar skeleton in the study downstairs, working on a laptop. Several rooms away in that general direction on the second floor, he spotted a woman’s skeletal shape vacuuming. Otherwise, that wing of the mansion was empty. 

He looked in the other direction, and blinked a few times as he saw two skeletal shapes pawing at each other in a room downstairs just off the garage. Whoa. He’d have to mention that to Lex later. Further in that direction on the second floor, he observed a skeleton’s torso rising and falling as it did sit-ups on an exercise machine in a smaller version of the downstairs study. That had to be him. 

Clark looked around cautiously, and then sped down the halls, listening at the closed door to operatic music and operatic obscenities directed at a Dr. Rawlings. He glanced around, scanning the surrounding rooms until he found a bedroom suite with a private bath. 

Minutes later, Clark sped back through the halls and down the stairs with a whoosh of air, skidding to a stop outside the study door and knocking softly. He heard Lex answer, and slipped into the study with a beaming grin.

“Hey!”

“Clark,” Lex responded, and Clark wondered if Lex was just really bad with names, and needed to remind himself constantly who Clark was. In _that_ tone of voice. Not that he minded, or anything. 

“I thought you could probably use some company.”

Lex nodded absently before glaring at his laptop.

“You look a little tense.”

“I’m not tense, Clark. I’m just terribly alert.”

Clark wandered over, sliding around behind Lex and looking over his shoulder. “What’s that?”

“It’s a computer, Clark.”

Clark rolled his eyes as Lex grinned up at him, relaxing a little. Clark blinked at the screen. “Wait, that’s not LuthorCorp stuff!” He pointed an accusatory finger at Lex. “ _You_ were playing solitaire again. And losing!”

Lex quickly closed the laptop. “I was not losing,” he retorted indignantly, “I was implementing a devious long-term strategy, in which I only appeared to be losing.”

Clark snickered. “Only you would have a long-term strategy involved in a game that you play against yourself.”

Lex shrugged, smirking. “I am a formidable opponent.”

Clark was about to answer when the doors to the study burst open, and Lionel Luthor strode in, albeit a little less forcefully now that he was blind. Clark blinked rapidly as Lionel got closer. Oh shit. _Shit!_ Clark clapped a hand over his own mouth and Lex’s simultaneously, giggling in helpless desperation.

Lionel was very, very pink. From his still damp hair to his hands, every inch of exposed Lionel was hideously mottled in bright hot pink at varying levels of intensity. His hair was the worst. It looked as if somebody had put on a blindfold and taken a can of spray-paint to his head and face.

Clark wrote himself a mental note to remember, in the future, a little hot pink fabric dye goes a _long_ way. Using the whole container had really been unnecessary. He looked down, and met Lex’s very big eyes looking back up at him. They were subtly crinkled at the corners, as if Lex were trying very, very hard not to laugh. He gave Lex a perfectly innocent look, and Lex rolled his eyes and licked Clark’s palm.

Clark jerked his hand away with a startled yelp, and Lex smirked at him before leveling his gaze to look at his father. “Dad,” Lex began, taking in a very deep breath. “You’re looking flushed. Are you feeling well?”

Clark clapped both hands over his mouth and inched out from behind the desk, looking everywhere but at Lionel. 

“Fine, son,” Lionel said. “Although your concern is curious.” He turned his head in the direction of Clark’s shuffling footsteps. “Mr. Kent, I presume?”

Clark nodded, and then belatedly realized Lionel was in fact, blind, and couldn’t see that. He lowered his hands, a huge grin plastered across his face. “Yep,” he replied, and then started snickering into his hands.

“You sound a bit breathless, Mr. Kent.” Oh. That was dirty. Lionel was _dirty_. Clark gave him a shocked look. That’s it, buddy. The gloves are off.

“I have allergies. To dust,” Clark clarified, helpfully, and then he crossed his eyes and stuck his tongue out at Lionel. Lex took a deep breath and let it out very slowly, his lips twitching. 

Lionel turned his head back to Lex. “Son, did you finish that report I asked for earlier?”

Clark inched over to stand behind Lionel, pantomiming his gestures and stance, only with a great deal more zeal and enthusiasm than Lionel usually used. Lex’s entire face was twitching now, but his voice remained calm. “Yes, Dad.” He glared at Clark as he pressed a folder into Lionel’s hand. Lex very slowly drew a finger across his throat, mouthing with perfectly clear enunciation, You Are Dead, at Clark. 

Clark grinned and flipped two fingers up behind Lionel’s head, wiggling them around, and then stopped because Lex couldn’t hold his breath like that for much longer without passing out. 

Lionel tucked the very blue folder under his very white shirt that was covering a very obviously pink arm. “Good. I do not wish to be disturbed for the rest of the afternoon. Have the staff deliver lunch to my personal quarters.” 

He stalked back out, brushing past Clark on his way and oblivious to the snooty mocking face Clark was currently making at him. The door closed with a bang behind him, and Lex buried his face in his hands, his shoulders shaking with laughter.

Clark stared at the door, giggling helplessly. After a moment, Lex glanced up at him. “What was _that_?”

Clark giggled and turned around, looking everywhere but Lex’s face. “That was a very pink, very dirty old man,” he replied, helpfully.

“Oh god,” Lex choked out, laughing loudly for a long moment before composing himself again. “What did you _do_?!”

Clark did his best to look innocent of all possible wrongdoing, and ended up looking incredibly guilty and amused instead. “I thought maybe this would make your Dad easier to live with.”

“Hand it over, Clark.”

Clark folded his arms over his chest and shook his head. “Nuh uh.”

Lex smirked at him until Clark puffed out a sigh that fluttered his bangs against his forehead. He flopped down into a chair that faced Lex’s desk and fished a crumpled box out of his pocket, handing it over.

Lex took it and scrutinized it with the devotion of an entomologist dissecting his favorite insect. At length, he glanced up at Clark, his lip twitching again. “This is permanent fabric dye, Clark. Clearly I have underestimated you.”

Clark grinned and stood from the chair, grabbing a pool cue from beside the table and racking up the balls. “I’ll break.”

They heard a shriek from somewhere in the mansion, and Lex snickered, rising from his chair to join Clark at the pool table. “I’m going to kick your ass for this, Kent.”

Clark grinned and bent low over the table, lining up his shot, his eyes impishly darting up to Lex’s. “Promises, promises. Bring it on, Luthor.”


End file.
